Field
This disclosure relates generally to transceiver testing, and more specifically, to loopback testing for a transceiver.
Related Art
There is increasing demand for a low cost radio frequency (RF) transceiver integrated in a system-on-a-chip (SoC) with an embedded controller or processor and other peripherals for use in smart home, life, sensors, etc. in a market segment sometimes referred to as the internet of things (IOTs). A constant envelope RF transceiver is commonly used for low cost low data rate applications and uses a single phase locked loop (PLL) for both the receive and transmit operations. During production, the RF functionality of such transceivers requires the use of expensive test equipment, which is not only costly but also inhibits parallel testing of multiple die. Also, with respect to a constant envelope RF transceiver having only a single PLL, testing of production transmit and receive functionality has to be conducted serially, reducing throughput and increasing test cost. Low cost testing of a processor or MCU is achieved by testing several die in parallel. However, if the MCU is integrated with an RF transceiver, this would be possible only if the transceiver allows for such an arrangement. Otherwise, the MCU and the transceiver portions would need to be either tested serially or the test speed of the SoC would be throttled by the slow testing of the RF transceiver. Therefore, a need exists for faster testing of a device having an integrated RF transceiver.